Souvenir
by jessewrites
Summary: Episode based, from Prime Suspect season one, where the mathematician's daughter is kidnapped. Six years later, Emily Burdick sees a familliar face.


AN: Numb3rs of course isn't mine. Nothing familiar belongs to me. This takes place six years after the episode 1.4, Prime Suspect, the one where the mathematician's daughter gets kidnapped.

**Souvenir**

"Emily, are you wearing that jacket?" her mom demanded.

Emily looked at the blue windbreaker she had on. "Yeah, is that a problem?"

Becky Burdick looked at her twelve year old daughter. She was wearing jeans, a t-shirt, flip-flops and the blue windbreaker in question. She sighed, "No, I guess it isn't." It was slightly too big, but Emily had always been very attached to that jacket, since before it had even almost fit her. It was also a painful reminder for her parents of what could have happened, and what had.

"Okay, then I'm gonna go, okay?"

"Okay," Becky said. "Have a good time, be careful!"

"Bye mom!" Emily called, halfway out the door. Her friend's mom took them to the movie theatre and Emily bought her ticket.

"You look a little young to be FBI," the guy tearing tickets remarked, smiling at her.

Emily glanced at the yellow lettering on her sleeve. "It was a gift," she answered.

The guy winked at her and said, "Theatre twelve. Enjoy your movie."

"He was hot," Savannah, her best friend, said. She was three years older than Emily; they had met because Emily had skipped three grades in elementary school because of her skill in math.

"He was okay," Jay said, shaking his head. Jay was Savannah's age, bi and not afraid to tell you. "Now that," he said, pointing at an older but handsome man, "Is hot."

Emily surreptitiously checked him out. She frowned. He looked oddly familiar. Savannah was talking again, so she dragged her attention back to the present.

"No, he's too old."

Jay laughed. "And Viggo Mortensen isn't old?"

Savannah shrugged. "Point, but that's different."

Jay shrugged. They entered the theatre.

The movie was fairly good, but Emily kept losing track of it, her mind wandering back to the familiar man in the lobby. As they left the theatre, Jay and Savannah bickered absently about the film. Emily looked around, wondering if she would see the man again.

Some one screamed. Glass shattered. Emily realized she was hearing gunshots and pressed back into a cubby by the water fountain, pulling Savannah with her. Jay pressed back, shielding Savannah and some of Emily with his broader frame.

People were screaming and running and Emily was glad they were out of the way so they would not get trampled. A bullet pinged off the wall above their heads. Another pierced the water fountain's metal side.

"Freeze, FBI! Drop your weapons!"

Another gunshot echoed the lobby and someone made a sound of pain. "Agent down!" A woman's voice yelled.

"Drop it," another man yelled, "Drop it now!"

Three gunshots, then silence. A moment, then, "Call the paramedics."

"On their way," the woman said. "Everyone okay?"

"Two civilians hit, a graze in the leg and a shot in the arm," a big black man said. "And Colby."

Emily could feel Savannah trembling and knew she should be terrified. Instead she was hyper-aware and tensely still.

"He's going to be fine; it's just a graze to the head. You kids okay?" The second male voice said.

Jay stepped out, and Savannah followed, leaning on him. Emily found herself looking into the bright brown eyes of the man she had spent the entire movie trying to place in her memory.

"Hey," he said. "Nice jacket." He winked.

Emily stared, suddenly recognizing him. "D-Don?" she guessed.

Halfway through turning around, he stopped and turned to look at her. Suddenly his jaw dropped. "Emily? Emily Burdick?" he asked, stunned.

She smiled. "Hi, Agent Don," she said quietly.

_Emily sat in a closet, terrified. The man who had taken her and threatened her Daddy was in here with a gun and he had told her not to make any noise. She trembled. Noises, talking, and footsteps echoed and she shivered, struggling to remain silent. The door swung open and guns were pointing at her. She started to shift and then thought better of it. She sat very still._

_The man in front said, "Hey Emily," and lowered his gun. He smiled at her and said, "I'm here to take you home." _

_Emily looked at him. He looked nice. _

_Then the scary man grabbed her and she could feel something hard against her head and he was growling at the nice-looking man._

_He said, "Not gonna happen." He was pointing his gun at them again. "Put her down or you're dead!"_

_Just as suddenly as he had picked her up, Scary Man put her down. The man lowered his gun and picked her up. He smiled gently at her and she wrapped her arms around his neck._

"_Look who I got," the nice man said to a lady. "We're taking her home."_

_Emily smiled as they lady told her, 'hey.' And the Nice Man carried her to his car. He set her down on the passenger seat and said, "My name is Don, Agent Don Eppes of the FBI. Your mom and dad can't wait to see you." As he was speaking he was taking off the funny black vest he wore and putting it and his gun in the back of the car._

"_Agent Don?" Emily asked. "Are you going to take me home?"_

"_Yes, sweetheart, I am." He looked at her a moment, watching her shiver. "Are you cold?"_

_She nodded._

_Smiling gently, Agent Don pulled out a blue windbreaker from the backseat and wrapped it around her. He winked and shut the car door, walking around to the driver's side. He talked to her quietly the whole way home, and when they got to her house, he picked her up and carried her up the walk._

_Her parents met them there. It was not until he was gone that Emily realized she still had on his jacket._

"Hey, Emily," he said, flashing a smile. "How's it going?"

Emily smiled. "Good. How are you?"

Special Agent Don Eppes grinned. "Great."

Just then, a woman called, "Don!" It was not the woman Emily remembered from years ago, but another.

Don smiled at her and turned away, heading over to the woman, who knelt beside a fallen man in a black vest Emily knew had to be Kevlar.

"Whoa," Jay said. "You know him?"

Emily looked at her shocked friends. She shrugged. "This is his jacket." There was no time to expand because a police officer was walking over to them, pulling out a notebook and pen.

It took some time, giving reports to the police and getting through the chaos of the lobby, but eventually, the three of them got out of the theatre. A crowd of people gathered outside the police line, waiting for news of loved ones.

"Emily!" Becky Burdick cried.

"Mom, dad!" Emily hugged her parents close. Only now was the fear hitting. Before it had been shock, but that was wearing off and she was glad to be safe in her parent's arms.

Ethan Burdick kissed his daughter's head, squeezing her. It had been horrible, seeing the news report of shooting at the theatre. It had been the kidnapping all over again, without the strong presence of the FBI agent who had been so calm and level-headed when he could not be.

Emily said, raising her head from where it rested on his dad's chest. "I saw Agent Don."

"You did?" Becky asked, surprised.

"We just said hello and stuff. He was working and I had to give my statement to the police."

A few minutes later, Don appeared, a curly haired man beside him, talking rapidly and gesticulating wildly.

Don was smiling slightly.

Emily took a few steps away from her parents. "Agent Don," she called.

Don looked over, smiling, eyebrow raised in question.

"Do you want your jacket back?"

He grinned. "Keep it," he called. "Souvenir."

Emily smiled and stepped back between her parents, letting them take her home.


End file.
